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Heidt defense denies notification of shotgun by DA

The defense was not notified about the existence of a shotgun that could have been the murder weapon, preventing Craig Heidt from getting a fair trial, his attorney argues in court documents filed Friday.

W. Dow Bonds wrote the nine-page reply filed in Effingham County Superior Court that the state did not turn over a property submission form about the gun because “he (the prosecutor) did not think it was relevant.”

Bonds made the arguments in answering the state’s response to Heidt’s motion for new trial. A hearing was held on the motion in front of Superior Court Judge F. Gates Peed in December. The judge gave each side time to file responses before making his decision.

“It is not up to the assistant district attorney to decide what is relevant and what is not relevant …especially when the same assistant district attorney made the issue relevant during his opening statements at trial when (he) accused the defendant of using the same type Remington model 870, 12-gauge pump shotgun to commit the murders,” Bonds wrote.

“He now attempts to convince this court that the … shotgun found in the possession of a key suspect, Robin Heidt, with whom the state engineered a deal to secure her trial testimony, and who was the wife of one of the decedents, and who was the initial beneficiary of $3.5 million in life insurance proceeds from the death of her husband, somehow is ‘not relevant.’”

Heidt was convicted in December 2010 of the August 2008 shooting deaths of his brother, Carey Heidt, and father, Philip Heidt, at the family home on Springfield-Egypt Road. He also was found guilty of shooting his mother, Linda Heidt, who survived the attack.

Bonds said prosecutor Michael Muldrew “made the unsupported assertion in his brief and to the media” that the defense was told about the shotgun and “chose not to act,” something Bonds said is “erroneous” and “false.”

He said there’s nothing in the certified record of the trial about the defense being notified about the shotgun.

The murder trial was held from Dec. 1 through Dec. 9, 2010.

Bonds said the defense’s trial strategy would have been different if the defense had known about the gun and its suppression “prevented the defendant from receiving a fair trial.”

Bonds also says the jury never heard that the shotgun was disassembled by John Henry Rast, very shortly before Rast killed himself at his sister Robin Rast Heidt’s house.

He said the shotgun could have been tested against imprint marks made on the rear door of the Heidt residence.